Hair Raising
by Atlin Merrick
Summary: What do John and Sherlock do when medication side-effects leave Sherlock with extremely sensitive follicles and a desire to experiment? What do you *think* they do? Have a sort of remote control sex of course...
1. Chapter 1

**Hair Raising**

"Don't touch him."

Sherlock ducked down the alley until he was in a pool of street light, then started rifling through his wallet.

"Are you listening, Sherlock?"

Seconds later he spun around and grabbed John's arse.

"Stop it!" John clapped both hands over his own bum. "What're you doing?"

Sherlock shoved his hands below John's hands and clutched. "Wallet John, _wallet."_

John Hamish Watson-Holmes stood to his full, stroppy height, which had the interesting and immediate effect of causing Sherlock to reduce his own. "A bribe," Sherlock hissed, "I need money for a _bribe."_

The good doctor stepped back, nodded curtly. "There, was that so hard? Words, just a few Sherlock, that's all I ask, now if—hey!"

Finished with contrition, Sherlock again groped his husband's behind, looking for—_there!_

Sherlock yanked John's wallet free, tugged out a few bills. "Twenty pounds will be enough, I'll give it back when we get home."

John laughed at the idea of Sherlock replacing anything at all ever—the cap on the toothpaste, twenty borrowed pounds, the sword in the stone if he'd happened on that. "Listen, I want you to—"

Sherlock was already heading down the alley but not so fast that John, teeth gritted, strop right back on, couldn't dart out a hand and snatch at the swirl of a coat hem.

_"Gah!"_

The great detective tripped, spun, scowled, hissed: "John Watson-Holmes if we lose this lead—"

A small man again deployed every inch of his smallness to shut a tall man right the hell up. "Don't. Touch. Him. Do you hear me?"

Sherlock huffed an acknowledgement _that he heard._ Then, pointedly glaring at John's pinch-fingered grip, he spun around and took off down the alley. If John was going to hang on to that hem he was going to be moving at speed _very_ shortly.

But it was good, it was all good. By the time Sherlock got to the end of his coat—and the alley—John had let go and returned to the shadows, tossing his husband a double thumbs-up as the lanky git dashed across Victoria Embankment and toward the shadows of Waterloo bridge for his assignation with the informant.

And while he skirted traffic—flaring that damn coat so he looked bigger, much like a kitten will puff up to appear more powerful—the good doctor nodded to himself and knew, he absolutely knew with one hundred percent certainty that Sherlock was going to let the informant touch him.

...

"It's not like I didn't tell you."

"Shut up John."

John _could_ shut up. However John was not _going_ to shut up.

"Are you a doctor Sherlock?"

Sat forlorn in the middle of the tub, an aggrieved consulting detective tugged his bare legs to his naked chest, wrapped an unclothed arm around the lot, then dug the nails of the other hand into his scalp.

"I'll take that as a no." John smacked Sherlock's hand out of his curls.

"You may be a super-genius, and you may know exactly what to say to a larcenous stockbroker five weeks on the run and living under an abutment, and everyone at the Met may have given you a nod of approval on the speed with which you closed the case…"

As his husband pontificated Sherlock's other hand crept into his hair and he got a good, bloody scratch going before John pinched him.

"Ouch!"

"…but not one of you is a doctor. None of you are _me._ Now…" John snapped on a pair of rubber gloves, took a battle stance though on his knees tubside, "will you listen next time I tell you _not to touch someone?"_

Sherlock was about to answer that purely rhetorical question when Dr. Watson leaned forward and mashed a handful of creamy goo into Sherlock's hair.

"THAT BURNS!"

Even as long arms flailed, even as twelve and a half stone of naked outrage writhed beneath him, John Watson rubbed treacly, eye-stinging medication into his husband's inky locks.

"I told you not to touch him," the good doctor said in purely conversational tones.

"YOU'RE KILLING ME!"

The knuckles of one wildly-waving hand thumped John's head, a pointed elbow clipped him in the shoulder, but it wasn't until Sherlock knocked himself half-unconscious with a hard knee to his own temple that John got some well-deserved cooperation.

"I never tell you how to deduce, what bribes to pay, the sort of statement to give at the Met—"

"YES YOU DO!"

"—I let you do your job and all I ask is the common courtesy that you let me do mine."

"I CAN'T BREATHE!"

"If you'd just do that we wouldn't have to do_ this—"_

Sherlock went fetal, slamming forehead to knees and arms around legs and he might have made huge, _huge_ sounds of aggrievement but John was _still_ on a roll.

"—and by that I mean if you'd just listen to my _professional_ opinion when I tell you _not_ to touch a man who has been living under a bridge for five weeks then—"

"I DIDN'T TOUCH HIM," Sherlock yelled in the vicinity of his solar plexus.

John rolled his eyes. "Head lice don't care who makes the first dance move, Sherlock. You touch him, he touches you, same difference to the head lice tango. All these bloody buggers care about is that one head gets near another and—"

"BLAH BLAH BLAH!" shouted Sherlock in the general direction of his itchy groin.

"Stand up you shouty, big baby."

Sherlock took a shaky-shuddery breath and whined, "I AM NOT A BIG BABY."

"And get your hand off your crotch."

Sherlock continued to scratch his privates. "IT ITCHES!"

"You can't get head lice in pubic hair."

Sherlock would beg to differ but he was entirely too disgruntled to give John the satisfaction of an argument. He just continued to maul his crotch with one hand and his head with the other.

"If you get that goo in your eyes you'll go instantly blind, so get your hands off your person and put the shower on and rinse out the treatment."

Sherlock was pretty sure John was lying about the blindness, but just-in-case he stopped scratching long enough to turn on the shower and it would be very true to say he was not even a little bit sorry the spray caught John in the eye.

"I'M SORRY JOHN!"

John was too busy swearing to reply.

...

"Do you feel better?"

Curled onto the sofa, back to the room, bare-naked spine radiating indignation, petulance, and also a desire for curry, Sherlock did not answer.

"I have no idea why you're angry at me, I didn't give you head lice. I tried to prevent you from getting head lice, so why this is my fault I really can't imagine. Yellow, green, or red?"

Sherlock lay very still, busy marshalling a fool-proof argument as to why all of this was John's fault. "Yellow please."

As John went to call in their curry order Sherlock brought to bear all of his considerable genius on figuring out how John could be blamed for the fact that his head felt funny, his crotch still itched, and maybe he was having trouble seeing out of his left eye. After a good and solid three minutes of super-geniusing—enough time for John to call in the order, turn on the telly, find something inane to watch, and also start scratching own head_—_Sherlock hit the nail on the head. "WORDS!"

John ignored the bellow from the belly of the sofa and said conversationally, "I got some nan. And papadums, too. I know how you like foods that shatter."

Ha. Now that Sherlock knew he had the entire upper hand he would not be diverted so easily (though he does quite like when comestibles surrender dramatically, and has been known to eat an entire half kilo of cinder toffee for the sheer joy of its brittle break between the teeth).

Still fetal-curled on the sofa—nude of course, because he felt it was more dramatic that way—Sherlock shouted again, "WORDS JOHN WATSON!"

John pondered. The food would be delivered in about twenty-five minutes. There was just rubbish on the telly. And John was bored. With a shrug the good doctor figured he might as well engage his toddler for the next little bit, being as there just was nothing much else to do.

"Yes, words, they are the simple, simple things I ask of you when—"

"YOU DIDN'T GIVE ME ENOUGH OF THEM!"

John pondered some more. If they were going to converse like civilised barbarians, the yelling would have to stop. "The yelling has to stop," John said conversationally, and then he added, somehow already knowing this discussion was not going to turn out as planned, "Explain."

Sherlock's curved spine straightened, his pert bum perted and John could _feel_ the vulpine grin on Sherlock's face before he saw it.

The good detective rose to a seated position and said in purely conversational tones, "You didn't give me enough words, Watson, so this is all your fault—"

"What now?"

"—and let me tell you why."

_I've never had Sherlock call John by his surname. Writing that sentence scandalised me completely. This story was inspired by the without-peer Chocolamousse who requested I expand on an entry in __Minutiae 38, said entry inspired by Benedict saying he has extremely sensitive hair follicles. P.S. And yet, once again, a "Surely this'll be a brief one chapter fic," turns into a crack ode of so-far three chapters._


	2. Chapter 2

"My fault? _My_ fault. I'm sure I don't know what you're talking about," said 'Watson,' who completely knew what Sherlock was talking about.

Wet curls mashed this way and that, Sherlock rose from the sofa like some sort of land-bound water god. The look was fetching.

"You look fetching," John said, employing a Sherlock-quality diversion. It fell on damp, semi-deaf ears.

"You spend an inordinate amount of time trying to brain-wash me with your manners and your morals. I let you do this because it makes you happy."

John opened his mouth to say something rude, Sherlock looked briefly reflective, said softly, "And because it makes me a better person."

Everyone absorbed this, then moved on.

"However, it goes both ways, Dr. Watson. You must _give_ if you _get." _

They were not discussing anything remotely pornographic—of which John was currently aware—but Sherlock's emphasis on those G-words was both aurally striking and…stirring. However, Dr. Watson pushed those thoughts aside. They had twenty minutes until the curry was delivered, more than enough time to bicker this on through to conclusion, not nearly enough time for a quality rut. And the boys of Baker Street nearly always favour high-calibre coupling over any other kind.

But that was neither here nor there, what was here was John, and John went and pretty much almost ruined _everything._ He apologised.

"You're right, Sherlock and I'm wrong."

In two years as lovers and then one as husbands John has said those words in that order exactly never.

Wait, that's not precisely true. He's apologised, he's admitted misunderstandings, misinformation, mistakes. But rarely right away. Usually it's after eight hundred weeks of squabbling, then three hundred days of qualified admissions. Because John and Sherlock? They bicker. They've done it from the day they met, they will do it until the moment they shuffle off their mortal coil. It is, was, and ever shall be one of the many, many ways they say _I love you, be mine._

Which is why John expressing his regrets so early in the game was not sporting.

The good doctor realised his error immediately and to cover his faux pas he argued about his lack of argument.

"It's not like you'd _listen,_ now is it? Because I could talk until I was blue and I'm sure you'd just swan around, selectively deaf, until I got to the words 'brilliant' or 'darling.'"

Sherlock swanned around the sitting room, waiting for John to stop talking. When at last he did, Sherlock completely ignored the entire last two minutes and said self-righteously, "So what should you have done under that bridge that you emphatically did not do, Mr. Watson?"

Watson, Mr. Watson, Dr. Watson—this was new. John liked it. He wasn't sure why. It, however, emphatically did not matter. What mattered was that Sherlock was now standing in front of a sitting room window and approximately one _thousand_ times John has asked him to refrain from doing so naked, those words, however, are some of the many to which Sherlock is selectively deaf.

But that was fine, it was really rather fine.

Because standing in front of that window, pontificating? Sherlock was also posing. John wasn't sure if it was intentional but, like the whole 'Watson' thing, that absolutely didn't matter.

"I'll tell you what you should have done," said the unclad detective, hand on hip, hip thrust to the side so that one butt cheek loomed, more saucy and plump than the other. "You should have said to me, 'Sherlock Holmes, genius detective, dashing man that I love—'"

At this point Sherlock paused to draw himself up and puff out his chest in a dashing manner. The marvelous side effect was that his arse stuck out even further, half-filling the sitting room with its ample swell.

"'—I suggest that you stay away from the stockbroker under the bridge, the one you located with nothing more than a hair sample and a half-cup of tepid tea, and here is my itemised list as to why.'"

Sherlock may or may not have lifted his chin and licked his lips in a very _Watsonesque_ way, gearing up, no doubt, to hold forth in a fashion he deemed very Watsonesque. But he, at that moment, pushed a half-dry curl out of his eye and back amongst its brethren.

And all the Watson words jammed up in his throat dissolved into the thinnest of air, except two: "Oh shit."

Watson himself was brought up short by the spontaneous swearing. But just as he was about to say something Sherlock _did_ something, and that something was to remove his hand from his head and lift the other hand _near_ his head, essentially hovering both hands in the air as if he were about to lay hands upon his own self in Watsonesque frustration.

But he did not do that.

Instead he turned from the sitting room window—much to the chagrin of the third floor neighbour across the street—those long-fingered hands still suspended either side of his big-brained head, and Sherlock looked at John as if John knew exactly what was going on and would tell him how to proceed.

John knew what was going on: Something. Because _something_ is always going on at 221B, and usually it's something Sherlock started, is in the middle of, forgot to finish, or for which he can be blamed. Yet this something, John sensed, was something that was maybe, just maybe, his fault.

Slowly, silently, as if making a foray across enemy lines, John rose and crept toward Sherlock, tread so stealthy even creaky floorboards did not creak.

When at last he stood before his husband, who looked down at him wide-eyed, hands still hovering either side of his dewy locks, John whispered, as if passing along intel about troop movements, "Something happened."

This profundity was met with a frantic nod.

John leaned confidentially close, whispered, "What?"

The detective had been expecting the doctor to tell him, but in lieu of that Sherlock just bowed his head.

A few heartbeats later—each coming more quickly than the last—John sent out a questing finger and tentatively touched one dark ringlet.

Nothing happened.

John thought about reclaiming his hand and saying something like, "Yes, well, curry should be here shortly, let's try the telly again," but John's a braver man than that and so John did what any straight-backed soldier would do: Sent out reinforcements in the form of a second finger.

Side by side, as if for moral support, fingers one and two moved tentatively toward those moist locks and a ringlet was carefully touched.

Nothing happened.

It was then that John thought to himself, _well there you go who knows what he's on about this time let's just call the curry place back because really that food should have been here by now._

As if sensing these thoughts, Sherlock did the one thing he could have done that would cause John to do the thing he did: Sherlock bowed his head lower still. And so John, who can not ever resist a compliant Sherlock, sent forth half a battalion in the form of an entire hand and tentatively he brushed five fingertips across Sherlock's scalp.

At first John had no clue what happened because it happened so quickly. And what happened was that Sherlock fell to his knees. As in _rattle the floor with the mighty thud of it_ fell.

But before John could look down and say, "What the hell just happened?" Sherlock looked up, hands still hovering beside his head, and said, "What just happened?"

In reply John a little bit stepped back, to make room for his _innocence._ Because if anyone in this room was sure of anything at all, it was John Watson, who was absolutely certain that this was completely his fault.

"John."

John tried stepping back again but Sherlock finally remembered what hands are for and took hold of one of his husband's fingers. He didn't _do_ anything with it, but the clutching did mean John could no longer proclaim his blamelessness with retreat.

"John."

The man so named was caught between a spidery grip and a hard place. Admit he had a strong suspicion as to what was going on and he'd also admit he was the one who had caused it to go. Admit nothing and…well there really was no downside there and John was about to possibly do that when Sherlock blinked up at him with big, trusting eyes.

"You might or might not be having a reaction to the lice shampoo and as a matter of fact the label recommends applying it to a small patch of skin on the inside of your elbow first to test for allergic response but I forgot to do that part does it feel very terrible is it burning oh god Sherlock I'm so sorry."

"John."

This happens. This always happens. Sherlock goes nearly-non-verbal in times of stress, capable of uttering one syllable and one only and that one is a name and that name is…

"John?"

Usually when this happens John has the words _for_ Sherlock. He'll go on and on when it's necessary that he go on and on, and usually that's easy to do because Sherlock's started something crazy, is in the middle of something crazy, or the crazy is on fire and so John can rant with verve, but not now. Now John found himself in an uncommon place—he was the one to blame—and so all John could do was this:

"I'm so sorry, Sherlock."

It was unfamiliar ground, this being the one in the right, and so Sherlock could be forgiven for mounting a high horse just now and riding hard, so to speak, but that was not what the good detective did.

There, on his knees, in front of a very contrite doctor and a third floor neighbour who'd gone and fetched her binoculars and her best friend, what Sherlock did was say something completely unexpected.

"John, pull my hair."

_Benedict says sensitive follicles and a year later I sit here breathing funny. The world is a strange and beautiful place. More to come. Until they come. Of course._


	3. Chapter 3

_Pull my hair._

That was what Sherlock said.

No. No, that's not what Sherlock said.

That was what Sherlock had _begged._ Because being on one's knees, eyes soulful-wide, a soft and tremulous lilt to the voice—these are the precise components required to qualify a thing as begging.

And John's response to that begging was not his usual one.

In days gone by, yesterday for example, the good doctor's response to Sherlock's entreaties—"Please let me put it in your…oh, oh, oh Jooooooohn!"—is usually to open wider, suck harder, or put more sugar on it.

Not today.

In response to Sherlock's pleading this time, John did exactly nothing. John had been expecting a high horse—an entire herd of them—so, completely sure he'd heard wrong the good doctor grunted, _"What _now?"

Sherlock's quite used to begging, wheedling, and supplicating to get what he wants; John's not his tiny tyrant for nothing. Some might say Sherlock even _likes_ all the imploring but Sherlock would call them idiots who clearly don't know a damn thing about the straight-backed Sherlock Begs No Man Holmes.

"Please," Sherlock gently tugged at John's index finger again, whispered, "please will you pull my hair?"

"Uh…"

Here's the thing: Sherlock sometimes likes a certain sort of pain. And sometimes John likes giving it to him. Sometime, however, was not this time, for it is difficult to feel sexy when you feel guilty.

"Sherlock…"

On his knees, mouth open like a guileless little bird, John's finger clutched tight in one fist, Sherlock awaited the illuminating particulars of John's plan of attack. Because when John starts something—and this was emphatically something John had started—he always finishes it.

"Sherlock…"

However, right now it seemed John was having difficulty finishing a sentence. John Watson was short of words. Fortunately, unless he's under duress, Sherlock usually has entirely more than his fair share and so, in a giving vein, the good detective offered a few.

"You could pull here." Sherlock gestured, using John's hand. "Or stroke there." Again with the John-gesticulation. "Perhaps you could push here and—"

Because this was beginning to sound disturbingly like that time Sherlock talked his husband into frotting with him at Downing Street during a power outage, John at last found his voice.

"Sherlock, I can't."

Sherlock released John's finger.

Somehow this seemed the worst possible response and so John opened his fine mouth and he damn well babbled. "I'd love to…to…to do all of those things but I think that this is possibly a bit not good. I think you're having an allergic reaction and that maybe we should just lie down or wash your hair again or maybe we should take you to the doc—"

Sherlock looked John in the eye, clutched a fistful of his own fringe, and yanked.

His entire chest bloomed with gooseflesh, every sparse hair round his nipples stood on end, and Sherlock's cock jerked up, a turgid little marionette on invisible strings.

"—tor."

After a few long seconds for everyone to absorb everything, Sherlock unclutched. All of his parts resumed their resting state.

While John's parts—particularly his heart—now thrummed like a mother fucker.

After long seconds Sherlock again took hold of his husband's index finger. Then Sherlock bowed his head and, with the sweet patience of a man who knows he'll get what he wants if he is sweetly patient, Sherlock waited.

The neighbour across the street clutched her friend so hard there were marks later.

John opened his mouth to reply.

There was a knock on the ground floor door.

The curry had arrived.

...

John Watson looked at Sherlock Holmes.

Sherlock Holmes did not look up at John Watson.

And that's what decided everything.

Because here's another thing: Sherlock likes a good curry. People think he doesn't much care for food but they're wrong. Sherlock does not much care for _boredom._ The tube is boring. Wordy courtesy is boring. Beans on toast are boring.

That's why if Sherlock needs to move he'll _stride._ If he's going to talk he'll fill a quiet room with the scatter-shot of his words. And if he's going to eat, he will damn well stuff himself stupid on the things he loves and one of those things is definitely yellow curry, so spicy-hot his brow goes dewy and he gets hiccups that can only be quickly cured by liquorice allsorts or John's ejaculate, depending on which is most available and not laughing its arse off.

And here's another other thing: The early days of their relationship are long gone and good riddance. And by that John means so long to the days when Sherlock slept poorly, ate poorly, behaved poorly, didn't know that being better at each would make him better at everything. But mostly good riddance to the days when Sherlock would avoid eating so stupidly often he'd end up with belly cramps, or bruises on skin too starved to well-heal.

Yes, good riddance to bad habits is what John says and for the last three years John's made sure they stay rid of them by rarely waking a sleeping Sherlock, by hardly ever correcting a courtesy even if it's wildly misplaced (complimenting a mourner on her hair at her husband's funeral) and especially, _most very especially,_ John will never stop Sherlock from eating, not ever (well unless it's a third bag of allsorts) (again).

Proving this last point, to better fill Sherlock up John has put more edible substances on his body in more places—some very tender and inclined toward rash—than he can count.

Proving this last point further, John's put sugar in meals in which sugar should not be, poured Sherlock teas and made him lattes, buttered toast and made eggs, he's fed and fed and fed his lover by his own hand and will do so until the day he's dead _and_ beyond if he can manage that.

So you will understand, for John to hear that knock downstairs and to know that there was piping hot curry a couple dozen metres distant, and to wait for Sherlock to respond and then watch him not do so…

…was a pretty big deal.

In the end it didn't matter. The best friend of the neighbour across the street caught up with the delivery guy as he was leaving. She paid for the nan, the papadum, and all the rest, then scooted right on back to her friend's flat.

...

And John Watson looked at the bowed head of Sherlock Holmes and had himself a think. The reason this think did not include thinking about a trip to A&E is simple:

Shit happens.

At 221B so much shit happens so often in such bizarre ways that if they went to hospital every time anything remotely shit-like occurred neither would have a chance to eat yellow curry or solve crimes.

So over the years they've ended up creating what John calls The System. The system is the very essence of simplicity: If a body part it is not bleeding, swelling, or on fire there is time to have a think and a cup of tea.

Over tea the following questions are answered: Does it hurt? If the answer is yes, they decamp to A&E. If the answer is no, the next question is: Are you lying? If the answer is yes, A&E. If the answer is no, there are generally no further questions and everyone finishes their tea and moves on with their life.

Without asking John knew that Sherlock was not bleeding, he was not on fire, and the only one perhaps swelling was John, as Sherlock remained so quietly on his knees, chin to chest. That just left one bit of The System to work through.

"Does it hurt Sherlock?"

Sherlock shook his head.

"Are you sure?"

Sherlock nodded his surety.

"Do you want it to?"

When John was eleven there were things he could not have imagined doing. Liking girls. Liking boys. Killing. Healing. Hurting his one true love. But John's into his forties now and he's done all of them and more besides. And that last bit? The hurting part. He does that a lot.

Because John's one true love is all nerve endings. Sherlock sees so much, _thinks_ so much about what he sees, that oftentimes it's as if the man's nothing more than axon and dendrite and pulse, exquisitely tuned to do one thing: receive.

John learned early in their relationship that one way to help Sherlock manage all that input was _to give him more._ And one of the easiest ways to do that? Hurt him.

Another thing John was surprised to learn: He likes to do that.

At last Sherlock looked up.

It's been years since they first got together but on Sherlock's face just now was an expression from those early days: A wide-eyed one, eloquent with curiosity, with a desire to _try it and see._

So certain was John of Sherlock's answer, that he was already breathing deeper, muscles loose, heart pounding, ready-not-ready to do things that were a bit not good.

Then the good detective went and surprised him.

"John," Sherlock said, wriggling his husband's index finger, "Will you make love to my hair?"

_I know this chapter took a hundred years to appear. I also know it's all talk-talk-talk. Sometimes that's part of the foreplay. Yes indeed, sometimes it very much is._


End file.
